“This is what Saba does. This is out of the playbook in the US, so it should come as no surprise,” said Baillie Gifford’s director of marketing and distribution, James Budden, speaking as a storm of US hedge fund investor activism has rocked the investment trust sector.
Founded in 2009, the Manhattan hedge fund Saba Capital, created and still led by Boaz Weinstein, is renowned for its highly activist shareholder measures. Saba has a long history of building up positions in close-ended investment vehicles, according to experts. This reputation has "definitely been at the forefront of the minds of boards, particularly the ones [Saba] has been building up big stakes in in recent months", according to Emma Bird, head of investment trust research at Winterflood Securities. Baillie Gifford trusts slams Saba for wanting to make 'self-serving and destruc...
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